Harvard Student Group Blazes Trail for Blockchain in Higher Education

Seattle, Cambridge, MA, July 11, 2018 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) --

Reflective Venture Partners is excited to announce a strategic partnership with the Harvard Undergraduate Blockchain Group (“HUBG”). HUBG is an undergraduate student group at Harvard University comprised of three committees - Investment, Technology, and Development & Marketing - focusing on fundamental education and industry application as related to blockchain technology, cryptocurrency, and investing. This group will help students build cryptocurrency investment literacy and learn blockchain basics in a curriculum based environment. HUBG will engage with organizations and open-source communities to identify opportunities for industry application.

“In the blockchain space, there is just too much hype and speculation. We want to bring an academic perspective to educate students and dig deeper,” says Arkam Javed, Co-Founder and Co-VP of HUBG.“ Shahan Khoshafian, Senior Associate at Reflective Venture Partners shares a similar sentiment, “We wanted to partner with Harvard University because they were looking to focus on the mathematics and science of blockchain and less about the fluff and buzz that comes with it today. From an educational perspective, RChain’s unique composition is suited quite well for higher education curriculum.”

David M. Otto, a General Partner of Reflective Venture Partners and Harvard alumni says, “I’m proud to be a part of this strategic partnership between Reflective Ventures and Harvard. Coming back to my alma mater and being able to work with these future tech leaders is inspiring. I’m looking forward to helping build innovative blockchain-based applications and platforms with this talented, visionary, and committed team of young people.”

The partnership will afford HUBG direct access to RChain, a third-generation blockchain platform. The mathematical focus of RChain - built on Rho-calculus principles - stood out to HUBG. Javed confirms, “RChain is tackling blockchain from a more academic angle and it’s much needed. The more analysis that’s available from an academic perspective, the more focus that’s put on technical fundamentals.”

This access will enable HUBG to meet one of its primary objectives: creating a foundational online course on blockchain technology and cryptocurrency for Harvard students and non-students alike. In addition to the development of blockchain course curriculum, the Reflective Venture Partner’s sponsorship and RChain partnership will enable HUBG to host conferences, events, and in-depth discussions on blockchain technology and protocols in the coming months.

Longer term objectives include HUBG establishing a student-managed cryptocurrency investment fund, creating a peer-reviewed research journal, getting involved with in-progress blockchain projects, building relationships with up-and-coming companies in the blockchain space, working to identify effective blockchain use cases, studying RChain platform growth, working with the RChain tech team to produce demos of Rholang and the RChain virtual machine, consulting with established companies interested in blockchain and cryptocurrency investments, and more. “There are a lot of synergies and potentials to be created,” Javed affirms.

Shahan Khoshafian, is looking forward to continue Reflective Venture Partner’s outreach to college and university blockchain groups throughout the country, stating ”These academic partnerships highlight the talent in universities across the board and this exposure to blockchain is going to be critical to its future success of becoming more widely adopted. The bigger picture is connecting great talent with great technology, and then giving everybody access to information we can all use together.”

As investments and resource allocation in blockchain and cryptocurrencies continue to gain legitimacy through proven use cases and steady adoption, the need for deeper knowledge, comprehensive curriculum and industry experience is paramount. “Students that work, learn, and grow with HUBG will be best suited for this new space that’s being created,” proclaims Javed.

About Harvard Undergraduate Blockchain Group (“HUBG”)HUBG is the sole undergraduate blockchain group at Harvard University. Its members aim not only to improve the understanding of blockchain technology, cryptocurrency, and investment through educational curriculum and conferences, but also to identify new applications through strategic industry partnerships and projects. https://www.hubg.io

About Reflective Venture PartnersReflective Venture Partners is a privately held and operated investment fund seeded by the RChain Cooperative. It is committed to strategic partnerships and helps fund, incubate, coach, and ultimately build the next generation of blockchain and dApps innovation through RChain and its network. https://www.reflectiveventures.io

About the RChain CooperativeRChain is a fundamentally new blockchain platform rooted in a formal model of concurrent and decentralized computation. The RChain Cooperative is leveraging that model through correct-by-construction software development to produce a concurrent, compositional and infinetly scalable blockchain. https://rchain.coop